Therapists' actions that influence their perceptions of "good" psychotherapy sessions

Psychotherapists' and an independent observer's ratings of the "good" to "poor" quality of therapy sessions were correlated with their ratings of various therapist actions. As predicted, significant positive correlations were obtained between the goodness ratings and the emphasis given by therapists to actions encouraging patients' expression of thoughts and feelings and the exploration of their reactions. For a number of other actions, however, therapists and the independent observer disagreed about whether emphasis of the actions correlated with "good" or "poor" sessions. Some possible causes and implications of these differences are discussed.